Surgical instrument storage and sterilization systems are known. These systems, sometimes referred to as surgical instrument trays or surgical instrument kits, typically include metal or plastic trays that hold a variety of general purpose and/or procedure specific surgical instruments, such as, forceps, scissors, clamps, retractors, scalpels, etc. These trays are brought into the operating room (OR) when preparing for surgery, and also are used as a means to organize, transport, and store surgical instruments in a medical facility.
A primary function provided by surgical trays, in addition to storage, is to facilitate group sterilization. Sterilization is of paramount importance in a surgical setting, such as a hospital, to prevent infecting patients undergoing surgery with potentially deadly infections. Prior to and after every surgical procedure, all surgical instruments and trays must be sterilized before subsequent usage. In order to increase the speed and efficiency of sterilization, entire surgical trays containing several instruments often are placed in a sterilization chamber at once. The sterilization chamber may apply to the trays and to all the instruments contained therein, any combination of heat, pressure, fluid, and/or vaporous sterilant. Sterilization techniques are well known. Thus, a detailed discussion of them has been intentionally omitted.
Because of the need to perform sterilization and the general need to maintain surgical instrument kits in good working order, they often are transported in and out of medical facilities through a distribution center for processing. For example, several surgical instrument kits may be picked up from a hospital or other medical facility at one time. In order to easily and efficiently transport the kits, several kits are placed in a single shipping tote. The shipping tote is a large bin, usually made of plastic or other durable, lightweight material that is able to securely hold two or more instrument kits inside. A worker then may load the shipping totes into a vehicle thereby reducing the number of manual operations that must be performed. Before transporting each shipping tote, a bar coded shipping label is sometimes prepared that identifies certain information such as the point of origin, the destination, and possibly the contents of the tote, i.e., the identification number of each surgical instrument tray contained in the tote. The bar coded label allows the tote to be easily and efficiently tracked and entered into inventory at the receiving facility. These labels are sometimes referred to as “airbills.”
Over time, and through ordinary usage, as well as due to rigors of the sterilization process, surgical instruments suffer wear and tear and eventually reach the end of their life cycle. Thus, it is necessary to periodically inspect and maintain records on usage of surgical instruments so that they can be replaced as necessary. Also, due to the fact that they are constantly moved from the operating room to sterilization, to storage through processing facilities, and back to the operating room, various instruments on a given tray may become lost. Because certain instruments are so specialized that they have no functional substitutes, it also has become necessary to regularly inspect trays and to readily identify specific instruments that are missing.
Existing technology for uniquely marking surgical instruments for identification is based upon visual markings, bar coding, or two-dimensional (2D) matrix (micro-dots) marking. These technologies are limited by being orientation restrictive, highly manual, require complex manufacturing processes, or are intrusive to the user of the instrument. Moreover, existing methods for performing these necessary identification functions are overly reliant on costly human interpretation. In some cases, a skilled technician may be required to identify the surgical instruments, which keeps the skilled technician from performing other valuable functions.
The description herein of various advantages and disadvantages associated with known apparatus, methods, and materials is not intended to limit the scope of the invention to their exclusion. Indeed, various embodiments of the invention may include one or more of the known apparatus, methods, and materials without suffering from their disadvantages.